Not the same thing at all, but there's still almost a whole season of Twilight Zone episodes (season 4) that I haven't seen, because they're hour long episodes that don't rerun. I know they're considered to be much worse, but even halfways decent "new" (to me) twilight zone episodes would be awesome. But they ALSO don't seem to ever show up on the streaming sites, even though the other seasons do show up.. So at some point I may actually just buy the DVD or BluRay set (and yeah, probably all seasons, as a completist). (I think 2 eps were edited together for a "TV movie" in the late 80s or early 90s.)

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They do turn up when Syfy does their TZ holiday marathons, so you might want to wait until after Thanksgiving and see what turns up then. I've seen several of them and they aren't as good, the extra time actually takes away from the Classic TZ "Twist ending". Note that when Rod Serling got a 1 hr network show (Night Gallery), he typicallly told 2 stories in the hour (and frequently they weren't 30 mins each.

They do turn up when Syfy does their TZ holiday marathons, so you might want to wait until after Thanksgiving and see what turns up then. I've seen several of them and they aren't as good, the extra time actually takes away from the Classic TZ "Twist ending". Note that when Rod Serling got a 1 hr network show (Night Gallery), he typicallly told 2 stories in the hour (and frequently they weren't 30 mins each.

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I guess I had only seen half hour reruns of Night Gallery.. I had thought it was a half hour show (though I *do* know that in syndication, they merged in an unrelated Gary Collins show).

But also, IIRC, for "Night Gallery", he was basically JUST a hired host... not heavily involved with it like TZ.

But also, IIRC, for "Night Gallery", he was basically JUST a hired host... not heavily involved with it like TZ.

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I think Serling thought he was going to have the same amount of control as he did on TZ, but the suits at the network thought otherwise, and by the end of the 3rd season "Creative differences" ended the show (at least according to Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_Gallery)

I've only known one person who did that. Never heard of the tradition before or since until now.

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In the movie 'The Bishop's Wife' (Cary Grant, Loretta Young, David Niven) the Christmas tree is purchased early but not delivered until Christmas Eve. Maybe it was the custom to wait late into December.

Actually that was at least the second generation of film to television technology. Originally as early as the 50s (and maybe even the 40s) and for many years up into the 80s, maybe later in some markets, "film chains" were in play. They were basically a film projector pointed right into a TV camera. The 24 frames per second of film had to be converted to 30 frames or 60 fields per second of TV. This was done by a system called "3:2 pulldown" where one frame of film was transmitted on 3 fields of video, and the next frame of film was only transmitted with 2 fields. In many television facilities, three projectors, perhaps 1 16mm, one 35mm slide projector, and one super 8 projector, were pointed at a system of mirrors that would direct the light from one of the three projectors into the camera.
Flying spot scanners only came into the mix in the early 80s if I remember correctly.

I liked seeing the Lucy Christmas special tonight in color. And for the flashback they used the original black and white. One thing I found interesting is that Santa brought and decorated the tree on Christmas Eve. Is that how that generation did it? I've never heard of that before.

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When I was a kid (60s), there were some families that did their tree Christmas Eve and that was a minor topic of discussion about when different families did it. Those that did it were in the minority and I don't remember any saying Santa brought it. But then we didn't have Christmas stuff in stores until after thanksgiving.

Actually that was at least the second generation of film to television technology. Originally as early as the 50s (and maybe even the 40s) and for many years up into the 80s, maybe later in some markets, "film chains" were in play. They were basically a film projector pointed right into a TV camera. The 24 frames per second of film had to be converted to 30 frames or 60 fields per second of TV. This was done by a system called "3:2 pulldown" where one frame of film was transmitted on 3 fields of video, and the next frame of film was only transmitted with 2 fields. In many television facilities, three projectors, perhaps 1 16mm, one 35mm slide projector, and one super 8 projector, were pointed at a system of mirrors that would direct the light from one of the three projectors into the camera.
Flying spot scanners only came into the mix in the early 80s if I remember correctly.

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In my entire broadcasting career, I have never seen or heard of anyone having a super 8 projector on a broadcast film chain. Only formats I have seen on a traditional camera film chain are slides, 16mm, and 35mm.

Decorating the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve is a German custom (actually the Kris Kind does the decoration while the kids are asleep). My mother who is not German insisted that Christmas started December 1st and we had a tree for the normal American duration not my Dad's German tradition.